


Sons of the Seawolf

by skdunning



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening, Dragon Age: The Last Court
Genre: Canon Parallel, Gen, Multi, Other, POV First Person, Rating May Change, mostly canon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2018-12-15 16:41:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11810010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skdunning/pseuds/skdunning
Summary: In war, victory. In peace, vigilance. In death, sacrifice. What a joke. The old men at Weisshaupt still judge me because I killed the archdemon...and survived. As if all the sacrifices I made to get that victory didn't count unless I was dead.They've become too complacent. They're asking the wrong questions of the wrong people, ignoring the problems in their own ranks while they hide behind a thin veil of politics, chanting their motto like it is some sort of magic shield. That doesn't bode well.Those old men don't know what to do about the their "Hero of Ferelden" problem. Thankfully, I didn't need them or their approval to end the Blight then, and I certainly have no use for them now. I will continue to do what needs to be done, for the sake of my brother first, my country second, and the Order when it suits me.(The story takes place right before the Breach and will run parallel to the events in Inquisition)





	1. Brothers

### Chapter One _Brothers_

I stamped the mud from my boots, startling a scullery maid and sending her reeling to both bow and retrieve the cacophony of copper pans escaping across the stone floor, neither of which did she handle with much grace. I fought snickering with the others in the kitchen staff and instead stooped to pick up a pan, as I had done so often when Nan was in charge.

Nan. She died that long-ago night, fighting off Howe's men with a cast-iron skillet to buy enough time for the rest of the kitchen to flee. I had arrived too late to help her. Guilt twisted my gut. All these years and I still couldn't let Howe's treachery go.

The lass stood abruptly with an inquisitive glance my way, her face alight with indecision. I stepped closer and chased her gaze until it had nowhere to retreat. A band of bright scarlet instantly marked her cheeks. "This one quite got away from you, Love." I winked as the girl took the pan back with shaking hands.

"Andraste's flaming garters, Pup. You really can't help yourself, can you?" Fergus didn't bother with the mud on his boots, but before the cook could say anything, he appeased her with the string of our kills. We had taken enough pheasant to feed the whole of Highever for the night. 

"All right, back to work you lazy lot," the cook said, shaking a giant soup spoon at them. She looked familiar and it took me a moment to place her. She was one of the elves that had worked the kitchen under Nan, and Void if her past didn't bleed through with grumpy words. "Never mind them, Ser. They've never met a king."

"That's quite all right, Maelina," I said, conjuring her name from the abyss just in time. She had a new scar across her brow, but her eyes had not changed--big, brown, and brilliant. "Just tell them that technically, they still haven't."

"Prince-consorts don't grow on trees 'round here neither," she responded with a grunt, but I could see the smile she was trying to hide. She wore it before, when Oren had stumbled across our haycock in the stables. Straw was everywhere. After my nephew ran off, I helped her find and remove every last shaft of straw that clung to her clothes, her hair, her body...

Fergus scowled and snatched a couple apples from the barrel, tossing one my direction. "Anora's insistance that your title will never be king is still a fluid, temporary sort of ultimatum. Remove her from the painting and the Landmeet will declare for you, without a doubt," he said, tilted his head as a signal to follow him and we vacated the kitchen. "Orena's brother still has the offer on the table, should you deem it necessary, that is."

It had been a long time since we were able to talk frank with each other, with our once tight relationship relegated to small talk over Fereldan state dinners. Fergus had grown a mite callous over the decade. A suggestion to engage the Crows would not have been made by him before Howe widowed him. The pain of loss had hardened him, but he wore it well. "Zevran offered the same." I bit into the apple and spoke through a mouthful of meat. "Believe me there are days I'm sore tempted to hire the Crows." 

The apple was crisp and tart, stinging my back teeth as I swallowed. I detested sour apples as a child, but like with so many other unappetizing foods, the joining cured me. I ate anything set before me now.

Alistair's cooking also contributed. His lamb stew was particularly gray and flavorless. I had to give him credit though. He managed the best he could with what we had and without complaint. It's not easy making lamb stew out of three potatoes and a handful of questionable deep mushrooms. Neither Alistair nor I had the heart to tell Leliana that the lamb in that stew was really nug meat. Thank the Maker Oghren was too drunk to notice. 

I followed Fergus to the old barracks on the east-side of the castle. Once he assumed the Teyrnia of Highever, he wasted little time cleaning up the aftermath of Howe's treachery and he rearranged the chambers. Too many memories for the both of us to remain in our old rooms. Now, the teyrn's living quarters occupied the old captain's suite. It was smaller, sure, but free of ghosts.

"What stops you?" He asked, returning to the Crows. We climbed the stairs slow and easy, to eat our apples and talk at the same time. "Don't tell me you're developing a soft spot for her-"

"Hardly," I replied with a half-groan. We pushed through the apartment doors and began to shed our hunting clothes. A fire crackled in the stone hearth, chasing the chill from the room and flickered shadows across the walls. "Can't love anyone I don't respect. The moment she was crowned, she placed herself on a pedestal and relegated the rest of Thedas to _the help_."

"Treats you with inferiority, does she? That's a laugh." Fergus shook his head and pitched his boots across the room, bits of mud flying off from the force of striking the wall. I followed suit, adding my archery leathers to the pile, though there was less mud casting off my kit. 

"Right? We can trace our lineage back before Calenhad. She's the one who lacks the proper breeding."

"Not exactly what I meant." My brother added quietly, "Mother was a Mac, too, lest you forget."

"Oh, I remember," I said through teeth. I was going to need a brandy or five at this rate. Highever haunted me, casting light on the pain I long pushed into the shadows. The stone walls of the castle were warm once, packed with so much love dust had no place to settle. The ghost of Mother's lavender scent still clung to the tapestries and I couldn't look at them. Lavender filled their death chamber, too, as Duncan dragged me away. Now, I couldn't smell the fragrance without tasting Father's blood in my throat. "Mother was the Seawolf to her end, Fergus."

"Why did you do it?" he asked. I shot him a confused look and he quickly clarified. "Why in the Maker's name did you marry that conniving shrew? Weren't you and Arl Eamon trying to put Maric's bastard on the throne?"

I sank into the Empress of Lace armchair, sucking in a breath of contentment at the touch of the soft velvet against my bare back. At least Howe's men let most of the furniture alone. Nan would have frowned at the state of my trouse, but I was too tired to strip down further. "Never fucked a queen before?" I said.

He threw his spent apple core at me. I let it roll down my chest to my lap, unfazed. "Trust you to think of fucking when Thedas is coming to an end," he said.

I laughed. He didn't know the half of it. Morrigan had given me one wild ride the night before we marched to Denerim. During her dark ritual, I began to think it was all a story, just an excuse to bed me. There was a desperation to the act, an intensity that I never experienced before or since. Maybe it was magic. Maybe we both wondered if the ritual would work the way it was supposed to. Maybe we both felt that it was our last night on Thedas. "I can't think of a more perfect time to fuck than the end of Thedas, can you?"

"You Serah, are a cad and a half and it is a very good thing that the Seawolf isn't present to hear any of this." He held his hand out for his discarded apple core, and took mine from me as well, to toss them into the fireplace. "Next I suppose you'll tell me you just wanted to be king for glory and gold. And that I know is utter druffalo shit so don't even bother."

"Sounds like a valid reason to me," I said.

"And it would be, if you were likes of that drake Rendon Howe."

I closed my eyes and leaned my head back, feeling tension pop through my spine. I remembered Alistair's pained expression, his anger at not being allowed to claim his own destiny, all because of his bloodline. _I don't want to be king. The very idea of it terrifies me._

"I did it for Alistair, truth be told, not that he understood that then the ungrateful shit. I didn't want to be that asshole that forced him to do yet another something he didn't want to do. And Anora refused to marry the man who killed her father, which meant that placing Alistair on the throne would have required us to execute Anora, or imprison her for life. That would have sparked a civil war. And there was no way I was going to let her rule solo. Let Loghain win? Let the _Mac Tirs_ win? Bah!" I waved my hand to dismiss the rising bitterness in my soul. I missed Alistair, missed his friendship, his cynical outlook, his inappropriate humor. He spoke of the wardens like they were the family he always wanted but never had. My entire family had been slaughtered, I didn't yet know if Fergus was even still alive, and I made Alistair my brother. He became my family. Not the whole of the Order. Just Alistair, damn him. I would gladly have died to save him. And he ran off without so much as a goodbye, kiss-my-ass, or an inappropriate joke. 

Like Morrigan. Though Alistair wasn't pregnant with my son, so there was that.

Fergus gave me a moment and I listened as he collected something from the sideboard, a liquidy-something in the unmistakable chimes of a Serault crystal decanter. I peeked through my eyelids and accepted a glass of Rivani Blackstrap, a spiced rum so strong it was banned in several Orlesian holds. "To the sons of the Seawolf and her Highever soldier," he said, clinking his glass to mine.

"And the shrew to which I'm wed. Maker keep the Queen!" I took a stiff drink and barely felt the burn. No one made alcohol as strong as Oghren did, at least, no one able to survive the process.

"Speaking of the miserable shrew. It's been a while since you two wed and there's a surprising lack of offspring. Not that I'd blame you, but it is unlike a...stud to let the mare alone. And she's what, close to forty years old now? Are you not trying to have an heir?"

Trust my brother to bring up children. If he only knew. "Oh I'm trying for the heir, the spare... Might as well make it fifty. I have the sneaking suspicion that Anora's seeing a hedge witch about keeping that from happening. Or maybe its my taint. Or the Maker. Or whatever. But yes, these are certainly _trying_ times."

"So there _is_ trouble in Fort Drakon." He sat in the chair opposite mine and took a measured drink from his glass. "Political arrangements are never easy, Pup. Father wanted you to marry for love, to spare you that..."

I shook my head. I knew what he meant, but Anora was a strategist, like me. She knew what her options were, and she knew what her survival entailed. It was probably the easiest choice she ever made; death or me. She remarked that anyone would be better at governing than Cailen or his bastard brother. But, Anora also didn't know everything. There was a definite heir of mine out there somewhere, being raised by an infamous Witch of the Wilds, Maker preserve us. Probably more than one heir that I didn't even know about being raised by a string of farmers' daughters and tavern wenches. 

So making heirs? That was just my excuse to lay the Icy Rose of Ferelden. The beauty of it: I didn't even need to force the issue or remind her of her duty. She came to my bed when it suited _her_ , which happened more frequently than I thought it would, and I got my revenge on Loghain every time I plowed her field to sow seed, and she took it like a wanton whore. 

That arrangement was perfect for me. I could care less if it was perfect for her. "Trouble? Not really. She likes to think she can control me through sex."

He curled his lip. "I bet I know how that works for her."

"If you're betting on me, it's in your favor. I was given hands on training by one of the best bards Orlais had to offer, you know. Anora never stood much of a chance. I've screw--er _manipulated_ most of her spies into keeping their mouths shut, so she doesn't even know about the others, like the willing chamber maids that provide a delightful distraction."

"Surely she knows about your red-head though, yes?" Fergus coughed. "I don't know how Anora could not. It's not like the Sister is trying to hide in the empress's court."

"Leliana's idea," I said, drawing the sword of mercy across my chest. "I swear to the Maker. Apparently you get more stake in the Grand Game if you have an official mistress or three."

"Maker's breath, Pup!"

"I don't think Anora feels threatened by it though, that's the weird bit. Maybe because no one wants to cross the Nightingale? Though, it's probably because I've seen Leliana, what, a grand total of three days in as many years?"

"Not by my accounting. You went to Kirkwall with her not too long ago," Fergus said, frowning with thought and judgment "Something about a seeker..."

I had forgotten that Fergus knew. My presence in Kirkwall was Leliana's idea, to be her cover. I played the distraction for a tightly-wound Knight-Commander while Leliana poked about in the tranquil's storeroom. The commander despised me and all the sins I represented. Captain Cullen didn't like me much either, probably because I reminded him of Kinlock, which was a flaming shame. I liked him, reminded me a bit of Grandfather Mac Eanraig: an iron will forged from the fires of chaos and tempered with the deep self-loathing that came from survivor's guilt.

Leliana and I stayed at the Blooming Rose for most of our brief visit. It used to be the best place to hide out, for more than one reason. Anonymity was a precious commodity, and the Madame guarded privacy like Dwarves their secrets. The perk though, of having an understanding, open-minded mistress was a lucky break for me, and we both made pleasurable use of the bordello. It was hard to explain to anyone outside the Wardens, what changes about a warden physically once he's gone through the joining. An increase in appetite didn't quite cover it. When I came to, I was grateful for the pain that lingered, because it allowed me to keep an erection at bay. I wanted to eat, fuck, and kill, not necessarily in that order, and not necessarily one at a time. My brother thought I spent too much time with turns-in-the-straw before the joining...

I loved Leiliana, more than I thought possible. But her work with Divine Justinia was important. She was where she needed to be, and I would just distract her.

I knocked back the rest of the blackstrap and returned us to task. "So to answer your original question, someday Anora'll have a child or she won't. I reckon the Maker has more say in that than I do. Ferelden will survive, either way." 

"At what cost though? No heir means no monarchy. I might sound like Loghain but he wasn't wrong. No monarchy leaves Ferelden vulnerable to other nations looking to expand their borders. And the banns won't give the throne to Amethyne."

"Shame. She'd make a pretty decent queen."

He shot me a look. "Never mind she's an elf, and they're just not ready for that, but they wouldn't take an adopted child over one of the blood." 

I turned the empty glass over in my hand, suddenly maudlin. I was a shit most days, but being a dad? That I got right. After the siege of Denerim, I snuck away from the palace to keep a promise to a dead woman, and searched for Amethyne among the alienage's elves. She was a flax-blonde waif of thing, half-sick with wasting disease. I got her medical help, and when she was well, I found I still couldn't leave her. So I offered her a home. I vowed to protect her, to school her, to avenge the injustices done against her. She would never again go hungry, not on my watch.

She said she would settle for a bit of raspberry cake and a wooden sword.

She was only seven at the time.

Fergus warned that a woman would tame me one day. Little did either of us know that it was a daughter, not a lover, that would do it. I was still wild, but not when it came to her. Amethyne was the best thing that happened to me. I only wished Iona had survived to see her beautiful little girl grown to the amazing young woman she was becoming. 

I cleared my throat. "I, uh, was lucky with Amethyne, you know. She was half grown when I adopted her though. I sire someone now, you'll have to take the poor kid in because the taint will never let me live long enough to raise him."

"You've got some years yet, surely," Fergus said, smirking. "You're like a filthy Fereldan copper, always turning up in the sofa."

I couldn't summon even a thin smile. "I wouldn't bet on that, Fergus." 

He leaned forward catching on to a meaning I wasn't aware had crept into my tone. Concern etched canyons into his forehead. "You having nightmares again?"

"Yeah," I admitted after a beat. "No worries, though. It's not another Blight."

That didn't alleviate his fears. He was quick to jump to the next conclusion. "Not the Calling, already?"

The sound of his voice, the gravel in his tone, the look on his face...it was a punch in the gut. It wasn't fair. Fergus lost more to Howe than anyone short of the Maker had a right to take. I wasn't the last of his kin--we still had cousins among the Mac Eanraigs--but Storm Coast cousins didn't count when one loses so much. There was no way they could relate.

But were these new nightmares the start of the Calling? I gave it thought over the past months, but even the Calling didn't seem to explain it. "Maybe, I don't think so though. It feels, I don't know, empty. Hollow. Like it isn't the right song."

"What do you mean?"

How could I explain? "There's a kind of dark song that draws you in when you have the nightmares. During the blight, oh man. That was the worst. And after we killed the archdemon, well, the song stopped and those sorts of nightmares ended. But these dreams, they don't seem to have the same urgency. What few old-timers I met, I rather got the impression the Calling is more intense, more driving. This shit is just an irritation."

"So you think this is what exactly? A fake calling?" It sounded strange to hear aloud what I had been thinking. Fergus's fear faded into confusion. "How is that possible?"

I shrugged, and thought back to when I drank Avernus's experimental concoction. I didn't tell Alistair then, but it unlocked something within my blood, and after the pain subsided, the nightmares decreased. I had the power to control my own taint. I always imagined the Calling would strip that control back from me, but so far it hadn't. If it wasn't a true calling, though, that raised a different concern. The prospect that something or someone could mimick it was a scary one.

And what could the end goal possibly be? Control of the crown of Ferelden? Seemed like a narrow-minded goal and extremely short-sighted for something that could not possibly occur with a simple twist of a mage's staff. Morrigan's dark ritual, as much pleasure as I got out of it, was still a tedious, draining ordeal. So a false calling would not be targeted at just me. All the wardens then, to send them into the Deep Roads to... what? Distract them? Control them? Why in the Maker's name would anyone want control of wardens? "Say, Fergus, you haven't seen that Howe lately, have you?"

"That Howe's name is Nathaniel and he is not his father, Pup." There was irritation in his voice. "Nate saved my life."

"So...not lately?"

"No..."

I wrestled with forming a plan. I didn't even know if anything was truly wrong, but I did know it wasn't altogether right. "Think I'll head up to Amaranthine on the morrow," I whispered. "Stop in at Vigil's Keep, see if there's anything the warden-commander or the Seneschal is willing to tell me. Duncan didn't have time to tell me everything I'd be facing with the taint. This could be something else."

"Why wouldn't they be willing to tell you? You're a Grey Warden on Grey Warden business."

I snorted. "They won't see it that way. I chose sides. In Orzammar, Ferelden, the Dalish...the one thing that a warden is supposed to never do. And I had the gall to not die when I killed the archdemon. They're still bit pissed at that. I had to hear of the talking darkspawn incursion after it was supposedly cleared up. Fucking hypocrites, the lot of them. Didn't have a problem with the warden-commander becoming the Arl of Amaranthine, did they? A decision I don't regret, though there has been blowback among the Bannorn."

Fergus knew the troubles. He took to providing troops for each merchant caravan, whether asked to or not, to keep the banns' meddling peripheral and away from Highever borders. "Amaranthine is still a Qunari powder keg waiting to explode," he agreed.

"Makes intel gathered from the Storm Coast a tad unreliable, at least with the stuff we get from land. Our cousins still report the seas with loyal hearts."

"Well, you see Nate, you'll get the truth."

"Fergus, I killed his father. Rendon Howe was a traitorous son-of-a-bitch, but he was still Nathaniel's father. And I didn't kill him out of any noble purpose or sense of patriotism. I wanted to murder him, wanted to watch the life drain from his eyes. I sank my blade into the man's gut and pulled his entrails out. For righteous revenge. Blight or no blight, I'd do it all over again without flinching or regret. And if Nathaniel had been anywhere close when it happened, I'd've killed him too, after I made him lick his father's blood off of my boots."

Fergus held up his hand to stop my spilling words. "When Nate saved my life, it was on the road back to Highever. He didn't harbor animosity, Pup, but I sure as the void did. I described every gruesome detail of my son's lifeless corpse and damn him, he stood there and listened. I punched him, twice, and he stood there and took it. When I calmed, he said nothing but offered me his flask and we drank until I could let my anger go."

"And? You think he won't hold his father's death against me?"

"I think if he did, he wouldn't have saved my life." He stroked his beard and stared at me for a moment. "I'm going with you."

"That's not neces--"

"Look, Pup, I haven't seen you in years except at court functions. And I'm sick of my sister-by-law. Every time she meets with the banns--well, I want my little brother back. So, I'm going."


	2. Vigil's Keep

### Chapter Two: _Vigil's Keep_

The journey to Vigil's Keep was long, but cathartic, despite the dreary weather. The constant drizzle acted as a cleanser for my dark mood, washing away the anxiety, the _not-so-terrifying_ nightmares, and bringing focus back to my thoughts. By the time we started the wind through the slough where it joined the flinty coastland crags, Fergus and I were tight again. and any trace of our formal roles of monarch and teyrn gone.

The highway had undergone some recent updating and necessary repair. I remembered traveling south with Duncan, un-sheltered, inundated with wind and rain. The King's Highway was in a terrible state then, and a dangerous path for horses, especially horses driven to the edge of death for fear of being followed by Howe's goons. The northern road was the same during the blight. Built by slaves and magic, the Ancient Tevene structures simply didn't survive the ages the way Dwarven masonry did. Improvements, though slow, were getting done, and more than a few sections of the raised road now had sail-cloth stretched between the tips of the archways. 

We rode with a small contingency of Highever men at our aft, six swords and two polearms, and the standard-bearer with the Cousland laurels flapping bright blue against the misty gray. My royal guard rode before, and consisted of even less, just three swords and a standard. Taking more men than that was an ostentatious display and prone to pique a band of thieves' interest. Because obviously we would have something with us that warranted a heavy guard. But a teyrn and prince without heirs traveling without guard was riskier, and was something we never gave much thought about when we were younger, and less jaded with the ways of treacherous friends.

Mud sucked at our horses as we turned from the highway onto the twisting mixed gravel path towards Vigil's Keep. Ash and pine mingled in sparce stands of birch. Life was returning where the remnants of blight had left their mark. Thanks in no small order to the miraculous Northern Prickleberry or whatever the blasted plant was called. It leached the poison from the land well enough, but Maker help the unsuspecting fool that took it for a common fern. The piercing thorns ensnared the careless and left them bloody and scarred. 

"--and then the tavernkeep charged two bits on the cider and four on the mead!" Fergus said with a laugh, completing his story about a night spent at a Rivaini inn. 

I whistled. The Rivaini held notoriety that rivaled merchant Dwarves for always securing the upper hand in a deal. Even humble shopkeeps had the air about them that inspired the need to haggle for a better price, a haggle that always snared the inexperienced clientele into losing more of his purse than he was prepared for. "Father wanted me in charge of the castle, but he should've chose you instead. Mother Maloi always said you could've freed Andraste with your words and altered the course of religion in Thedas if you were present at her execution."

He coughed deep from his gut, and I regretted the statement I made so carelessly. I knew his response was a tiptoe around the dark memory. The old 'what ifs' haunting our progress forward. What if Father had picked him to stay behind instead? What if he had been there when Howe's murderous goons burst into his apartment? Would he then have prevented the killing blows of his wife and son, or just died alongside them in the stupor of chaos. I knew he must of thought these things, because I thought them, the entire long and miserable journey along the King's Highway from Highever to Ostagar. Duncan gave me silent space, which I probably needed, but it was a cruel courtesy, to be locked alone in the growing darkness of my soul; 

I killed a caged deserter because I had so much unresolved anger, because my drive for vengeance and my need for blood was pumping hot in my ears, because I knew I could spin the story if I needed to and get away with it. Poor sot. I would say that he was Howe's victim too, but what kind of man was I if I didn't claim my own misdeeds? Though the murder was a better kindness than the meal would have been. His corpse was still there beneath the snow when Alistair and I returned to Ostagar. I found some peace in that. What the darkspawn would have done to him had he still lived... 

Fergus nudged his mount around a patch of tumble-nettle that had strayed into his side of the road, and steered the conversation on a brighter path. "Maloi said that did she? Never mind it was you that had her wrapped about your fingers. My ability to negotiate with a Rivaini tavernkeep pales in comparison to the stunt you pulled in Jader."

I wiped moisture from my brow, trying to conjure the memory to which he referred. "Jader?"

"You don't remember that, Pup?" He laughed, joyfully laughed. It was an amazing sound. "I don't know how you could forget. Our cousin's wedding? Only fifteen, weren't you, and you just cool and smooth as a summer cucumber. That blonde lass didn't stand a chance to your charms. Didn't take long, did it, before she was gifting you her virtue on a silver..."

We rounded the last bend just as the image of a long winded ceremony drifted around the edge of my memories. There was a blonde, well, more of a raspberry blonde. We made a bed of leaves in a dark corner of the garden labrynth. The boning in her corset poked against my ribcage uncomfortably until the initial assault of kisses concluded and she granted passage to unlace her. Fergus was right. I didn't know how I could have forgotten her. She was the first I had who taught me the value in patience as a lover. Every step closer required a show of effort before the reward could be savored. And she was very savory, a buzzing delight for all my senses.

But the artistry to which Fergus referred was not in the seduction of the raspberry blonde, but the game of Wicked Grace that followed after. Smoothing over the ruffled feathers of an Anitvan Crow, an Orleasian Bard, and a Dwarven Deshyr after I swept the table was no easy feat. In the end, all three even thanked me for the lesson in humility.

The shadow of Vigil's Keep loomed across the outbuildings and the patch of pumpkins to the foregate. As the royal guard peeled away to flank the rear, I reigned to an uneasy halt, aware of an absence of whispers. Fergus fell silent in response, waiting, a soldier alert to a subtle change in potential. The last I visited the old Howe homestead was in '38, I felt Wardens by the score then, harvesting wheat alongside the tenant farmers and shoring up barns alongside the ostlers. 

Vigil's Keep stood void of taint. Even in the hours of approaching twilight, I expected to sense the movement of, at the very least, a handful of sentries milling around their quiet posts. 

"You got that serious look on your face, Pup." Fergus shifted his weight in the saddle. His free hand rested upon the hilt of his sword, preparing. "Serious and you never bodes well." 

"Either the Crown's records of Warden occupancy are grossly outdated or..." I squinted. There was movement in the guard tower. An untainted silhouette signaled to someone I couldn't see in the courtyard below him.

"Or?" Fergus prompted.

"Or the Wardens simply aren't here."

"What, no wardens?" Fergus twisted his confusion away and towards the opening gate.

"Not a one." I urged my mount forward when the soldier at the open gate beckoned, adding, "At least not a one at post."

"Who goes--" The soldier paused. I caught his eyes flicker from the royal standard to the crest emblazoned on the flap of my cloak. It was my own design, one I was proud of. A merging of the Cousland laurels with the Warden's griffon wings surrounding a the Fereldan mabari rampant wearing a crown split in twain. Recognition flashed a relieved expression into the soldier's face. He cycled through a hasty and shallow bow. "Thank the Maker you're here, your Highness."

"That sounds comforting." Fergus observed with an uncharacteristic streak of sarcasm.

Both guards filled in the courtyard behind us. I dismounted as an ostler shuffled our direction, and Fergus did the same. I extended a hand to the soldier, who gripped my wrist with an eager handshake. "You know me, excellent. That saves us some time."

"How could I not know the Hero of Ferelden, the man who single-handedly ended the Blight!" 

I grimaced. "I did have help you know. This is my brother Fergus."

Pleasure, my Lord Cousland." He let go and tilted his head at my brother. "I met a soldier from Highever who was under your command during...Well, I'm proud to meet the both of you. Name's Barnaby."

"What's your status, Barnaby?" The one thing I admired most about the Order of the Grey and their non-tainted staff was the complete lack of ceremony for receiving guests of so-called importance. If I was at the Empress's court in Halamshiral, or even at the reserved Teyrn of Ostwick's court at the Hall of Roses, I would have to go through a receiving line of a hundred people, dance two Remigolds and a Waltz, and drink at least a half-dozen toasts to my health before I could get anyone to give me a hint of a sit-rep. "Why are there no wardens manning the walls?"

"They're all gone," Barnaby said, confirming my suspicions with a frustrated sigh. "I'll take you to Seneschal Voldier. I'm too low in the chain of command to have any details for you."

The ostler took the reins of our horses without a comment and led them and our men off towards the stables, while Fergus and I followed Barnaby across the darkening courtyard. The rain gathered in splashy puddles where the cobblestones dipped from need of repair. There were more than a few buildings that showed some signs of neglect, adding to my concerns. It appeared that the Wardens left long enough ago that damage from the recent storms had gone untreated for lack of manpower. 

Fergus noted it, too, nudging my attention to the gutters of one of the barracks. A bird had nested there, but the nest was brittle with abandonment. "They should have started shoring up the buildings in preparation for winter by now." He pointed next to a patch of cracked thatch atop a different structure. "And that sort of damage is too far gone to fix without replacing the whole roof."

Though we Couslands always prepared for the worst of the winter gales, our castle at Highever never faced the severity that Vigil's did. Our stone walls and turrets were set too far inland and best suited to monitor the arteries of roads through the valley. VIgil's Keep was just too close to the shore, a convenient sentry to protect the coast from enemy invaders, but it bore the brunt of the angry sea-storms in conjunction with the snows and ice that the altitude brought. Mother used to call Amaranthine the Jewel Made of Ice for that very reason. Sheets of frozen muck developed at the first of harvest and extended well into the last of Spring throughout the small arling. It took strong and committed people to eek a living from the unforgiving rocky soil. Any troubles that came this way were magnified under the weight of the Maker's Nature.

The Arling's receiving chamber was a cold room with an awkward stretch from dais to door. The fire in the hearth couldn't much warm anything beyond the space before it. I glanced back at the doors as we entered, and met the homely and frowning face of Eliane Howe. I was surprised that the portrait of the old arlessa still hung in the place. Even more surprised that the likes of Eliane Bryland and Rendon Howe could produce a beauty like Delilah. 

Delilah Howe. She was one for the books. A tall, gangly, too-thin teen, with the straightest raven hair that always seemed to hang flat and lifeless around her shoulders even in the stiffest breeze. She clung to her brother Thomas's shadow like she was afraid to be anywhere else, no matter how much he pushed her away. Perhaps she was afraid he'd be sent to the Marches like Nathaniel...Mother always felt uncomfortable around the Howes. She had told me a hundered times if she told me once, when I started my hormone-driven exploits, that I could marry whomsoever I wanted, except for poor Delilah.

 _There's just something about that family, Pup,_ she said. _I don't want us to be joined by-law._ Delilah was far too young for Mother to have cautioned Fergus about such a marriage.

The night of Howe's treachery flared up in my memory. That sniveling drake sized me up like I was a wild hog destined for his supper table. _My daughter Delilah asked after you. Perhaps I'll bring her next time,_ Howe said, in a tone that sounded like forced small talk. 

But. In case it wasn't small talk. _To what end?_ I replied, remembering my mother's cautious fears and my own disinterest.

Mother worried about a match that I never put much thought into. Apart from the fact that even then, I was more interested in the sport of companionship instead of a marriage, Delilah was simply not my type. She always seemed a bit too off in the head, and she lacked a sense of humor that would have made the awkwardness endearing. Looking back, she was perhaps just suffering from the rigidity of her upbringing, but at the time, her attitude was annoying and offputting. 

Well, I was even more of an ass then, for sure, and even if I knew what Rendon Howe was about, I would probably have still been unsympathetic to her plight. Still, and despite the lifeless landscape of her straight raven hair, Delilah was not without her charms. Sufficient cleavage for her tender age delighted in the modest constraints of her maiden bodice, and was certainly a nod in her favor. Better though, her eyes refracted light like a chandelier of Serault's finest crystal when she was merry, and her smile, though rare, was infectious and drove away briefly the shroud of melancholy that seemed a constant weight on her shoulders. When she was merry, she was positively stunning to behold. But she never smiled at me, and my impatient eyes strayed to others who did.

Fergus told me Delilah married a merchant and was due with their third or fourth child. The thought brought me a quick smile. For all the suffering Rendon Howe caused, it was reassuring to know that his family could move on from that, like the Drydens. Perhaps Nathaniel wouldn't hold his father's death against me after all?

The doors closed with complaint on stiff hinges and I tred across the worn carpet to the dias. Warden standards flanked the sides of the fireplace, but other than that, the room was plain save for a couple of odd bookshelves in asymetrical alcoves. Seneschel Voldier was an Antivan, small stature, refined bones, eyes sharp and missing nothing, and the deep olive skin tone the Northern races were renowned for. Despite his slight build, he gave a solid handshake and stood like a man who had at least glimpsed into the shady undertow of life and learned a thing or two from it. 

"Seneschal, it's good to meet you," I said after a hasty introduction. "Though, in truth I was hoping to see the Arl Commander."

A dark expression formed around the downturned curl of his thin frown and spread across his angular face like the Blight in a cornfield. "The chill of this room," he said, off topic by intent. "Perhaps we should go to the office, your Highness. It has been a long and wet ride, if your cloaks speak anything of your travels. Come."

He waved us through an anteroom door and dismissed Barnaby with the same flick of his wrist. Fergus and I exchanged glances before following the Antivan down a narrow hallway. The wood paneling that lined the walls were painted a sheen of clotted cream and the fire light from the brass braziers refracted in the limited space with a harsh glare. The office at the end of our trek was significantly warmer. The fireplace heated the chamber efficiently and the desk and shelves were invitingly cluttered. I relaxed, free of an oppressive first impression. 

"To tell you the truth, Highness, I'm glad you are here. I can rid myself of some guilt." Voldier sank into the armchair at the head of the desk like he had the added weight of Thedas strapped to his neck. 

"I'm hardly a revered mother," I replied with a humorless smirk and shook my head at the offer of the seat before me. My legs were grateful for standing after the last hours of horseback. "A confession to me won't bend the ear of Andraste."

His eyes confered with the ceiling. "Andraste and I have an understanding. She lets me sin as I will, and I defer the Maker's judgment to the day I take my final breath. But that's a different story." His gaze returned to me. "I was under strict orders from the Warden Commander, not to inform the First Warden or the Queen of Ferelden, and I'm growing more and more worried that I should have disobeyed the order right from the start."

I looked at him sideways. "I don't suppose you'd like to clarify?"

"Not particularly, no," he replied dryly. I deserved that. "But under the circumstances...See, the arl, Warden Commander Andras, he abandoned his post, and took a few of his men to the Deep Roads."

 _Did they suffer this calling too?_ "Why?"

He shook his head. Something was amiss, but whatever it was eluded him, I could tell. "I don't rightly know, your Highness. I...don't even know where to begin."

Maker bless the patience of the Teyrn of Highever. Fergus was bloody perfect. "Take your time, and start from the beginning, wherever that beginning starts for you. We'll catch up."

Voldier nodded. "For me, it started when Warden Commander Clarel, from Orlais I think she is, appeared unannounced at our doorstep. She was all forms of secrecy and ill-boding, she just had that...that aura about her, you know? Anyway Arl Commander Andras has had a rough go of it here. He's done his best of course, but there is still some people who miss the Howes, and there are even more who are too focused on the arl commander's pointed ears instead of his prudent actions. It's changing, Highness, slowly, but it is changing."

"So you, what, thought maybe Clarel was here to replace him?" I attempted to put the two halves of his conversation together, and that was the only picture I could draw.

"Not at first." He sank his chin into his hand, pinning his elbow to his desk like a pillar. "She chanted the motto a lot. One of the lads whispered she was sneaking into Ferelden because the Arl of Redcliff didn't want her here."

The heat of anger rose up my spine and I stood rigid as a rail. "Teagan Guerrin can bar her from Redcliff, but kicking her out of Ferelden is my jurisdiction."

"That was the funny bit," he replied, slowly, as if tring to make sense of it himself. "She said she was here on official business and she required the Commander's undivided and unquestioning support. And when he said that as the Arl of Amaranthine, it was his duty to inform the crown, she said that it was strictly warden business and you were never to know."

I had never met this Clarel person, but I already didn't like her. Duncan didn't have time to tell me much, but he did impress upon me that Wardens did not operate within country borders without providing a courtesy notification to the established government, especially in times without blight. He even pandered to Cailen's whimsey out of a deep seeded need not to antagonize the monarchy. Cailen! He was a puppy, over-eager and void-bent on finding glory on the battlefield, as if such a thing ever existed. War was ugly business, best fought with ugly people. The sacrifices of the innocent, though unavoidable, were best kept from the battlefield. 

If Clarel had intentionally dodged the Ferelden throne, she was up to something Ferelden wouldn't approve of. It was better to ask forgiveness than to beg for permission. A tactic I myself would probably have used. Perhaps she had orders from Weisshaupt? "How flaming short their memories eh? Think the Old Men at Weisshaupt finally decided what to do about their Hero of Ferelden problem?" I grumbled. 

He shrugged. His tone went thick and dry. "Doubt it. They know exactly how popular you are with the people. Weisshaupt has sent inquiries through the Arl Commander a hundred times over if once, and his answer was always the same. Don't poke the Mabari."

A bittersweet laugh gurgled within my chest, remembering with sobering clarity word for word of Nan's tale of Hohaku. I sniffed the memory free after a heartbeat, of the loyalty of my own hound. I'd never find another like him. "Well, I'm happy for it, I suppose, to be compared to a Mabari. Though it would have been nice to get a response about the talking darkspawn in a more timely fashion. I could've helped--"

"Ser?" Voldier raised an eyebrow. "We sent regular missives to Fort Drakon."

I almost doubled over with the force from that statement. He looked as confused as I felt. "What do you mean, regular missives? To whom?"

"To you, Highness." He bent to the side, pulling open a drawer. "Our Mistress of Coin was a severe task master when it came to records. I have a fairly accurate account of communications received and sent."

He handed me a ledger that overflowed with inserts. Without direction, I leafed carefully through bills of laden and all manner of receipts until I discovered an entry for a runner's fee. Fort Drakon, it stated. To the eyes of His Royal Highness, Prince of Highever, consort to Queen Anora...It was an older title given me at the beginning of my marriage, and one I abandoned quickly. I never liked the way it fit. Void, I didn't much care for Prince-Consort either, but it was the one that stuck. Anora said it with a snide tone meant to keep me in my place.

I ran my finger over the few words written in a terse script. The message was detailed in a two-line summary. _All the Wardens are dead or taken. The apostate took the Joining with Mhairi and Oghren. Mhairi didn't survive. Nathaniel Howe set free._

Frowning, I flipped Another entry dated a few days later indicated a search was being conducted for the Warden Cristoff. _Nathaniel Howe returned and insisted on taking the Joining. It was allowed, he'll be closely watched._

There were others at regular pages apart. They all started _No response from Crown--No response from Weisshaupt._ My lungs constricted. I hadn't received a single one. I would have helped. There were few things I did so well as killing darkspawn. Was it Anora who kept them from me? That didn't make sense though. Despite her many faults, she was a statesman who deferred to the expertise of betters until she herself could claim mastery. 

She was married to a warden, but she still didn't know a thing about us.

Who then, who kept the crown away? What did that have to do with the present issue?

Fergus did not allow the silence to get out of hand. "You mentioned the arl commander took a few men and vanished. When did that happen?"

A dark scowl vexed the Antivan's refined features into a twisted knot of worried lines. "Been a year at least now. Clarel, she argued with the arl commander, and before you know it, she had her lackeys imprison him and instructed me to gather the lads into the grand hall. She said she was replacing the arl commander and she had a plan from Weisshaupt. All the other non-wardens were kicked from the room, and the arl commander escaped with a handful of his closest men. Clarel and Andras both swore me to secrecy, but for different reasons I imagine now. Not that it matters much. They both left me in a right fix. I've got banns arguing with policy. Soldiers arguing with officers. Amaranthine begging for the assistance against pirates that we have provided without hesitation in the past. Not a one is listening to me."

"Who went with him?" I asked. A hint of a plan tugged at my thoughts, but I couldn't make sense of it yet.

"Eh, no one I think you know...except the Dwarf," the seneschal replied with a sneer borne of sheer distate. Couldn't be anyone but Oghren to inspire such a reaction. I swallowed my smirk. "And uh, well, Nathaniel Howe."

"I...ah, I don't suppose you've seen Warden Alistair lately, have you?"

"He was here, training recruits. He stormed out on Clarel's meeting. Ain't seen him since neither."

 _So whatever this is, Alistair isn't a part of it,_ I thought with no small amount of relief. Despite the way he left, Alistair was still my brother.

But something was definitely brewing. I traded an apologetic glance with my brother. He nodded. Responsibilities and crises trumped our bonding mission. "With the crown's permission," Fergus said, his voice thick and formal, an edge of sadness lining his words, "the Teyrn of Highever wishes to extend governorship to temporarily include the lands, rights, and tenants of the Arling of Amaranthine, until such time as a new arl can be promoted within the ranks of the Order of the Grey, or the missing arl commander returns to his post."

I allowed my brother to complete his monologue before responding, in part because I knew there were some protocols that could not be ignored. This was one of them. I pulled off my signet ring. "Permission granted. Let's keep this official. Quill and vellum, if you please Seneschal, and some sealing wax."

The seneschal exhaled like the breath he held was formed of lead, and the worry in his face melted away. He reached into a desk drawer, retrieving an inkwell and scroll. "Happily, your Highness." 


	3. The Bitter Wind

### Chapter Three: _The Bitter Wind_

I stood against the icy wind on the widow's walk of the keep, eyes closed, soaking in the chill. Flashes of dragon-fire swirled around thoughts already disquieted by an absence of whispers. During the blight, I was never far from Alistair, never far from his poisoned essence. I could sense him move through our campsites, through the castle at Redcliff, even through the Fade when the Sloth demon fed off of our insecurities. It had been so long since I felt the presence of anything tainted, it was hard not to leap to the most extreme of conclusions.

That Alistair stormed out on Clarel, that was telling. His moral code was more rigid than mine, but he bled in Warden blue, so orders from an agent of Weisshaupt? He wouldn't question like I would. He applauded sacrifice for the greater good, celebrated it even, when I would be more than content to watch Thedas burn until it encroached upon my family. So whatever this Clarel was planning, if Alistair didn't want any part of it, neither did I. It was that simple. All I had left to do was discover what it was, and put a stop to it. 

But short of cracking open the Golden City, which had already been tried with Thedas-shattering results, I couldn't think of a single thing Alistair would turn away from. The last missives from Weisshaupt that I had read in the meticulous files of the Arl Commander spoke only of the darkspawn threats and petty in-house squabbles, or the odd case when one of our recruited rapists would fall back on old habits and rape someone, or speculation on how the Hero of Ferelden cheated death when killing the archdemon. All other cares of Thedas--the religious wars, the mage uprisings, the tension building at the Tevene-Nevarran border--not a one could spark a sideways glance from those foolish Old Men who retreated like cowards to the pit of a landscape called the Anderfels. 

If they truly cared about battling the darkspawn threat, they'd be petitioning the surface governments to provide troops for Orzammar, whether the Dwarves wanted us or not. They'd strive to get back some of those lost thaigs. But they didn't give two shits about what goes on beneath us until it was time for our callings, or time to be paraded around a vicious dinner of state, to be used as a puppet display for Dwarven Kings. Why weren't they pushing for more support at Adamant Fortress? Or for an inquest into whatever it was that turned Knight Commander Meredeth into a glowing red statue? Why did they sweep the Corypheus incident under the rug and pretend to the outside world that it never happened?

Duncan mentioned, abeit too briefly, his regret that the Order of the Grey did so little for the Dwarves during their years of vigilence. He spoke of few troubled topics on our harried exodus to the freezing south. He didn't want to speak of warden issues with his vengeful new recruit, or perhaps I didn't want to listen, when all I could hear were the echoed screams of Amethyne's mother when Howe's butchers cut her down, and the silent cries of my sweet nephew and sister-by-law, mouths frozen open in terrified shock.

_Don't look, Mother!_

_What manner of fiend slaughters innocents!_

I reached down to scratch my hound's ears out of muscle habit and sighed into the lull of loneliness. Twenty years, he was an extension of me, never far from my side. I opened my eyes and looked down at the void. Maker, I missed his putrid breath, his acidic slobber, his rank fur. Amethyne and Leliana both pushed for me to acquire another Mabari, and maybe they were right. Maybe its what I needed.

Maybe later. The shadows grew darker at the outer gate and the sound of horses stretched to me from across the courtyard. Vigil's Keep had company. And I felt the discomfort of hunger. Trading melancholy for perseverence, I made my way back to the Grand Hall by way of the kitchen to liberate a pasty or five. The cook cast me a weary, disinterested glance, evidence I was not the only warden to have ever violated her unprotected larder in the hours between meals. Perhaps that was the reason there were pasties to begin with.

The scullery maid was not as skittish as the poor lass back in Highever, and more skilled in the artful glance from the edge of her eyes. She pressed confidently against me as she reached around to place an unwarranted kettle on an awkward shelf of cabbage and carrots. "Pardon," she said, breathy. "My manners. I appear to be in your way."

Hormones flooded my blood, only to be drowned by my stomach intent on eating. "You're not in my way. Yet. But, if that is your intent, I would not be adverse to you trying again. Maybe later? And maybe someplace not so...cabbage-y?"

"Maybe." The tilt of her head was a pleasant seduction. "It's been a long time since a warden was last here. I wonder. Do all wardens share the same...appetite?"

Morrigan had said something similar, the eve of our child-making liaison. _I am curious. Are you so gifted because of your tainted blood, I wonder, or is it the natural, agile stamina of a rogue which gives you so much...appetite?_

The fair scullery maid really didn't need to work so hard to be subtle. The pronounced curve of her hips, the graceful turn of her neck, the heat from her body warming the space between us. Yes I noticed. I swallowed some food and my stomach was temporarily distracted, giving some room for my hormones to seep further downstream. "Some of us are blessed with more skill than others," I replied with a whisper. She was within one more breath of noticing just how blessed and I within one more bite to proving just how skilled. I have had such appetite in stranger places than a pantry, under threat of being discovered by more than just the cook.

"Ardella! Where did you get to?" The cook called from the kitchen, dispelling the event cooking in the pantry. "These pots aren't going to clean themselves."

"Saved by your mistress, Love." I stepped back an inch to get myself back in check.

"Was I?" Ardella asked while gliding to the door. "If I'm in your way later, who is to save me then?"

Her hips inspired, swaying from my view. I lingered with that fresh in my thoughts until my stomach regained the upper hand of the battle. And there was still the matter of the arrivals at the gate. Enough time had passed, they'd be in the great hall and my brother would be in the thick of whatever grievance that brought them here. 

Last of my pilfered pasties in hand, I flickered into the hall silent as a shadow and unnoticed by all save my brother. It was a small gathering of arguments that congealed before the dais. Voices assaulted the vaulted ceiling competeting for space and dominence, and angry fists threatened other equally angry fists. My brother let the brood storm for a moment, his face lined with determination, while the senescal whispered information at his shoulder in irregular intervals. I leaned against the bookcase in a statis of mild amusement watching the waterwheel of accusation.

"--abominations. Magic is evil--" said a puffed lordling from a nowhere holding, throwing his hands up in failed emphasis. 

"And theft isn't?" shrieked a woman's frenzied response, her accent foriegn and heavy with emotion. I focused on her. She wasn't a young woman, but she was still in full possession of her beauty. Tears laced her eyes, kicking twice the light of the fire and shining like a pair of bright emeralds. She and her companions, five by my counting, were bound together, prisoners of the righteous mob of the lordling's men. "You had no right, to take our supplies from us."

"I've every right!" the lordling replied, his voice pitching all the more. "You are apostates on my land, and those things were obviously stolen and will be returned to their rightful owners. As a devout Andrastian, it is my duty to--"

"Enough." Fergus spoke with authority, his quiet but firm voice slicing through the din like an arrow. Voices instantly settled, rendering tempers to a simmer. "Lord Bencely, stand you aside a moment."

"But--"

Fergus cut the protest short with a look that meant business. I hid my chuckle in the last bites of crusted lamb and potatoes, sucking spice from my fingers as I swallowed. My brother reminded me so much of Mother in that moment. That look accompanied many a curbed lecture in my youth. 

"Lord Bencely I know," Fergus continued, addressing the tear-streaked woman. "He's the Bann of Tidewater. But your acquaintance I have not yet had the pleasure of making. I am Fergus Cousland, Teyrn of Highever, temporaily assuming the duties of the Arling of Amaranthine while the arl commander is away. I'm judging from your accent, you are from the circle at Starkhaven perhaps?"

Her eyes flickered from her fellow hostages to the calm veneer of law before her and her face was alight with indecision and mistrust. "Poppy Fennickson, my lord," she said, introducing herself at long last. "And yes, Starkhaven was our home until the prince kicked us out. By force, I'll have you know. Under threat of death. We're being penalized for crimes we have not committed and hunted by templars without cause..."

 _Sebastian._ I ran into him in the Kirkwall Chantry during my stay there. He was a pious man then, bland and boring, but not altogether unlikable. Men like that though, the zealots, those are the men to watch. They so very easily become tyrants. Logain MacTir was that sort of man, zeal for his country so fierce it corrupted him. _This man is not the Hero of River Dane._ Anora said like a practiced statesman. _And if not for the warden, I would be dead already._

The speech that turned the tide on the votes at the Landsmeet. Alistair thought she was part of the problem. And I agreed with him. Anora, as strong-willed as she made herself appear, spent her whole life controlled by stronger men. Her father, King Merric...Me. She would never have turned on her father, except for her precious throne. I figured that it was the one thing that gave her true celebrity. Her greatest fear was being erased from the history books. I saw it in her face, when she fought so fiercely to fund that blasted memorial to her father against the practical opposition of near bankruptcy. I saw it in her face when she looked out at the handful of people when the statue unveiled, disappointed that there weren't scores more to celebrate his tainted legacy. I heard her whisper as she wept, _We still have the throne, Father, but we lost the people. What have I done?_

"And what did Miss Fennickson do, exactly, Lord Bencely?" Fergus asked with pointed emphasis.

"She's an apostate, your Grace," Bencely said in a tone that added _isn't it obvious_.

"Did she hurt anyone?"

"What was that?"

Fergus shifted. "Cause injury. Willfully break a person or an object with blood magic?"

"Not yet, no. We caught them before she or the others could carry out their wicked plans."

I grinned from the side of my mouth. My brother had given enough verbal rope to Bencely for a decent hanging. "Then what specifically led you to believe that Miss Fennickson and her companions are apostates?"

Bencely sneered, too oblivious to the fact he had already lost his arguement. "They're not in a circle, are they?"

Fergus nodded, then pulled his knife from the back of his belt. "Miss Fennickson, I apologize for the deplorable actions of my lesser lords," he said, stooping to cut the bonds from her wrists. "You and your traveling companions are welcomed guests in this hall, and will have food, shelter, a safe place to practice magic. Seneschal, I assume the wardens have such a place, do they not? To practice magic in?"

"It was never widely advertised, your Grace, but yes," the seneschal replied. 

"Your Grace!" Bencely spurted.

"The fault with your assessment, my learned lord, lies with how these mages left their circle. You accuse them of apostasy. Prince Sebastian shut their circle down, and banished them from Starkhaven. So if they are apostates, my lord, then certainly their Prince failed in his Andrastian duty to keep them encircled. Instead, he turned them loose. So, he is either responsible for aiding and embedding known apostates, or his actions gave them open permission to leave. Either way, they are not prisoners of Amaranthine."

"And," I spoke up from the shadows of my corner, startling the mob, "as the Prince of Fereldan, I am inclined to write a strongly worded letter to Starkhaven, to point out his crimes. Before I declare war on his insignificant princedom, that is."

"Bit extreme, don't you think, Brother?" Fergus prompted, and offered assistance to the mage to rise from the floor.

I shrugged. "No more outlandish that this lordling's overreaction to a handful of circled, dare I say harrowed mages on my lands."

"They're my lands!" 

"Which makes them my lands!" I barked back, lunging forward to poke his chest. "I am your fucking prince, and Fergus is your Teyrn. And we say we are taking responsibility for the welfare of our guests. So challenge me. I fucking dare you! Call a right of combat and see how far that gets you."

He cowered away, red-faced and puffing, but refusing to look me in the eyes.

"Anyone else want to step forward to abuse our guests?" I challenged Lord Bencely's mob. Just minutes before, they were all willing to build pyres and set the mages afire alive. Not a voice was left to dissent. "Then all of you, go home. Leave the matters of state to your betters."

My royal guard stepped from their posts astride the hall and expedited the dissolution the mob from the keep. The seneschal sighed. "You may have complicated matters unnecessarily, your Highness."

Fergus waved the words away. "Bah, I can handle the aftermath, don't you worry. My little brother has never been short of trouble the whole of his life."

I laughed from my gut. "Indeed, my brother, indeed. I am sorry though, if my presence undermined your authority."

"If anything, it displayed the power that secured my position here." He smiled. "Bencely's a pompous shit, but a coward, and a bit of a blow-hard gossip. None of Amaranthine's banns will question me after this."

"No, they'll just hire an assassin to take you out of their misery." The senechal signaled for a page. With guests came the need to make living arrangements, even if temporary, and the page would have his hands full with new orders to bring to the chamber staff and the kitchen. 

"Lest you forget, my wife was an Antivan. Wouldn't be the first time I was under threat of an assassin's blade." Fergus returned his knife to its sheathe. "Probably won't be the last. Now, Miss Fennickson, when did you say that Conclave of yours was taking place?"

"In about three months. We were hoping to meet up with our sister circle from Markham before then, but I fear the weather on the Amaranthine Ocean may have delayed them." The mage rubbed her wrists where the bindings had been and her emerald eyes flickered away to meet my gaze. The air crackled with energy. "You're really the prince? The Hero of Fereldan? The Warden who took down the Archdemon and ended the blight?"

"I was merely doing my duty," I said with a wink. She blushed, her breath pushed her breasts against her confining robe. Interest and hunger surged through my blood. My brother shook his head, suppressing a laugh. He saw it too.

Fergus was right. I really couldn't help myself.


	4. The Seduction of Opportunity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this is so slow in following. Life, they say, is what happens when one makes other plans. Anyway, the Couslands get lucky and the mages screw themselves.

### Chapter Four: _The Seduction of Opportunity_

Ardella the scullery was in my way upon my arrival to the guest-quarters. She was in my way when I had the idea to undress early for bed. She was in my way when she insisted upon turning down the sheets, when she insisted upon warming those sheets, personally, with the heat from her own flesh. She was definitely in my way when she decided she wore too many clothes to make good on her promise to warm the bed with her own flesh.

And there was definitely no one around to save her.

She had a tatoo on her right hip, of a dove in flight. Though small, the feathers showed remarkable detail. An artist that skilled would have been dear to engage, and that spoke of deeper finacial support than a scullery would have. I admired it, though its significance escaped my limited knowledge of the woman. A present perhaps from a sibling, or lover. I traced the image with my thumb after I pressed her back into the down matress. I had no tatoo for her to return the favor, but she was bolder in her exploration than I had been. Her skilled, practiced hands pulled me into the wide, inviting space between her parted legs. 

"May I?" I asked, my fingers circling closer to the tender folds below her dove. I was, afterall, a gentleman--well, most days anyway--and not prone to take liberty of anyone.

"Shut up--" she whispered, "--and take a fucking hint."

I paused only to lick my fingers, for how could I have disobeyed such a direct order?

The candles in the room gave up half their length when that I released, laden with sweat, and rolled from atop to rest aside her. The fire slacked as I, and pulsed with an afterglow that kept the room comfortable, though in truth, I hadn't noticed any chill during our dance. I heard her breathing settle, matching her rhythm to mine. "Well, your highness" she said, between measured breaths. "you certainly rise to the occasion."

Too high on spent hormones to form a response, I surrendered to the calm. Sex gave me a temporary reprieve from my calling, much like the distraction it provided during the blight. Ardella nuzzled up beside me, the cool touch of her skin a welcome sensation, and I adjusted my arm to better envelop her. For the moment, I had peace.

 _Your eyelashes flutter when you sleep,_ Leliana said the night we first shared a bedroll. _I want to pluck them and keep them in a jar._ The memory brought a smile to my lips. She was always a little awkward around me when we were alone, tripping over her words like an inexperienced school girl, and not the bard adept with seduction. She claimed later that it was a subtle, deliberate design in her art, but I didn't believe her. She allowed me past her warded guards, to be a part of her very soul, as I had her. She was never just a turn in the straw.

Leliana could still my taint with a glance, or a breath, the way no other partner could. The fiend in me would say it was her bardic arts, her professional seduction, that drove the song away faster and kept it at bay longer when we were together. But the idealist, I knew it was because the Maker was in our love. Nothing tainted could exist in the sight of the Maker. 

Alistair's bastardy kept him pure if his adherence to the Wardens' Oath did not. I tried to get a room for him at the Pearl, but he shied away, and said something about his Templar training. I wanted to explain what sex could do for him, for his tainted blood, but I had no idea how to do so without making things creepy and weird. I could only hope he found someone in the last decade. A warden's life was a solitary one. The effects of this false calling could be harshest against those who didn't know how to drown out the song.

Or maybe his Templar training was just as effective. I tried to get him to teach me, but he refused. He said that the moral ambiguity of a roguish scrapper didn't lend itself well to templar doctrine. Sten though, was a fast student, even as he thought us weak and undisciplined.

Ardella purred. My hand had employed itself to the gentle teasing of her exposed breast, her nipple erect against my thumb. Her body pressed against my thigh. "Nothing like a warden's stamina," she breathed, her breast filling my hand. "Do you think we could bring the griffon back to life?"

 _Griffons only exist in stories now,_ Orenna said, shushing her son.

Heat of anger pulsed through my veins souring the prospect of another round. The calm dissolved and the dull throbbing whispers seeped in to fill its void. My eyes opened and my muscles tensed, I sighed and uncoiled the scullery maid from my body to rise from bed.

"Did I say something wrong?" she asked. She touched me, to pull me back. I scooted away.

 _She doesn't know,_ I reminded myself, before I said something cruel. "Nothing you said or did, Love." I reached for my shirt and shrugged it on. "I'm a haunted shell of hate and lust. Not your fault you triggered the wrong memory."

"Killjoy." She sank back into the bed. "Fine, I'll do it myself."

That caught my attention. I slipped my trouse on and turned, curious despite my change in mood. She grabbed her own breast with one hand, suckled the fingers of her other hand to wet them, and then applied those fingers to her groin. I was about to rethink my decision to dress when something sparked at the edge of my senses. Not the same tug of the blood I could feel when a tainted creature was about, more like a prey at the scent of a predator.

I crossed the room in an instant and grabbed my sword and main-gauche from their scabbards. The subtle chime of steel breaking free from leather sank dulled into the stone of the walls. Ardella, startled from her self-pleasure, flushed from the bed to cower at its side. "Darkspawn?" she asked, her voice at the edge of panic. "It can't be darkspawn, can it? They sealed the vaults below us just after the blight."

"Shh. Stay back." I concentrated on identifying sounds beyond the blood pumping in my ears. Sensing darkspawn was easier of course; they echoed with the tainted song of the old gods. However, the hunt was the same no matter the quarry, and my skills as a predator were honed in battle, as natural to me now as breathing, and as necessary.

The faint smell of scorched fade and earth filtered into my quarters to mingle with the thick of sex and crackling pine in the hearth. The Veil was thinning: the Brecellian Forest, Soldier's Peak, even the castle at Redcliff bore a similar stench. Poor Connor. To be so young and struggling alone with forces beyond his abillity to control. _Conor is blameless in this,_ his desperate mother wrung her hands. _Please. Is there--Is there no other way?_

Like mist, or dreams, the threat haunted the air and pressed against the fine hair of my arms. It felt immediate, but not close. A demon maybe, an abomination among the ranks of the magi guests? 

"Messere?" Ardella peeked at me over the mattress, her eyes rounded and wild. The woman so confident in her sexual prowess had become a terrified girl shivering and exposed.

 _Do you hear that? I think someone's in the hall. I'm going to go look._

I shook free of Iona's ghost and the night of Howe's treachery, and cracked the door open to peer into the hall. The shard of light wicked from my room but illuminated little. The hallway was an abyss of shadow and darkness. No one stirred from their rooms but I. "Just...stay put Ardella," I said, not sure of what else to say, and slipped into the cold.

I crept along the hallway, donning the moonless shroud of shadows and followed the scent of burning fade. I paused at my brother's door, waiting for the reassurance of his soft snore, evidence of a blissfully unawares sleep. Instead, I heard a steady rhythm of bedposts thrumming against a wooden floor and the deep, crescendoing breathing patterns of two distinct people engaged in the pleasures of flesh. I knew well those sounds muffled by closed doors, and not just from my frequent visits to establishments of temporary delights. I often passed my brother's closed room where he and Orenna oft retreated, and that of my parents where they still engaged in youthful pursuits, though in truth I never lingered at their door. It had been enough to know my parents still craved each other, as they aged.

I grinned despite myself, happy to witness that I was not the only Cousland who dipped his quill in a new inkwell. And except for the unknown situation that drew me out to begin with, I might have stayed until my brother's culmination, to spy upon the lass that captured his hard-earned attention for a short while.

A sharp scream echoed through the courtyard and changed the urgency in an instant. I ran, no longer concerned of waking those asleep in their beds. I could get the mess, whatever it was, under control before it drew a crowd of innocent bystanders to injure. I hit the door with explosive force, and thrust into the frosty night. The mages were housed in the barricks next to a small training arena. A pulse of lightning flashed through lead-paned windows and another scream ignited the air. I pushed more speed off the frozen earth and propelled onward, adrenaline-mad and driven.

The scene inside the arena resembled a failed Harrowing, uncontained by trained templars. The youngest of our vistors was transfixed in the center, swathed in the glow of a lyrium bath and the faint green scar where the fade cracked. A puddle of some unspeakable muck seeped into the flagstone floor against the west wall, and another halfway to the north wall. The other mages were engaged with a demon I had not yet seen. 

_But the darkspawn taint! That was foreign to them,_ Avernus said with macabre celebration. No templar left me once again with no option, and I cut my hand as I had so often done in Alistair's absence, no longer feeling the sting, and smeared my taint on my blades. Prepared, I rushed in, slipping in and out of stealth to strike with dizzying speed. The demon shifted its focus from the poor apprentice frozen in the center of the room, and from the mages gathered, to me. 

A clawed hand swiped and I leaned back. A wake of air chased it with a foul stench, singeing my sinuses and lodging deep in my throat. I recovered with a cough and lunged, pinpointing a weakness in its side. It screamed with the fury of souls forgotten in the Void and renewed its attack. I parried, feeling a surge of replenished vigor in the unmistakable sensation of Creation magic Wynne had often used. The mages rallied around me, throwing curses and hexes or shields. 

I dispatched it moments later, with the aid of someone's crushing prison, and collapsed to the floor, drained from use of my taint but yet renewed, as if my blood could remember a time when I was not poisoned, and for a fleeting moment, could capture the cure from the very air.

"Mattisine!" Poppy shouted and rushed to the girl in the center. "Mattisine, please come to."

I craned to see if Mattisine responded just as my brother's shield scraped the floor beside me. "I came to help, but I see I needn't have rushed," Fergus said. He wore the basics of his armor, but only just, looking as disheveled as I had been. "Though you're a might winded, Pup. Out of practice?"

I choked on my laughter and panted until I could catch a breath that wasn't coated with a mist of demon ilk. "Hardly. Just overspent. Being reborn twice in one night does tend to make one heady."

After linking our arms wrist to wrist, Fergus folcrummed me up with relative ease, then pointed to my bloodied hand. "You picked up the wrong end of you sword again, did you?"

"Nah, it's just a trick I picked up. Demons don't like the taint, you see." I tried to make light of it, to draw attention away from the cutting. It wasn't a healthy thing to do in a fight, and Fergus was already over-worried about the well-being of his baby brother.

He shot me the Seawolf's look that told me the matter wasn't over, and turned to survey the mages. "Staves away, please--I'm not going to bite," he added when their reluctance to follow the request became obvious. "Now, does someone want to explain to me what happened here? I'm feeling a little left out of the loop you know, and that's a rude thing to do to your host."

"Sorry, Messeres. We were, well, we figured..." the raven-haired lass started to say, then suffered from a lack of words. She twisted to rest her staff against the wall. An unassuming branch of hickory that dripped with Antivan Moss, it buzzed against the flagstone like it was alive with bees. It reminded me of a staff my hound once found.

It may have even been the same staff. Morrigan turned her nose at it and discarded it as soon as she could replace it with something she deemed more worthy. 

"It was my idea," Poppy said after a long, uncomfortable silence, cradling young Mattisine in her arms. At least the child was breathing, and her eyes open. But she was bright with fear. 

"What was your idea, Miss Fennickson?"

"First off, this isn't what it looks like."

Fergus looked at me, eyebrow raised. He was yielding to me, to what my experiences might have taught me. "You mean this isn't an attempt at a Harrowing?" I asked.

"I..." Surprise rounded the worried angles of her face. I stood in a brief sea of gapes. "Well, maybe it is what it looks like then. So many outsiders leap to blood magic when something goes awry with our kind. I guess I assumed you'd leap to the same conclusion."

Fergus shook his head, a slow turn, indicating his disbelief. "My knowledge of such things is admittedly limited, but it is risky, is it not? Without templars."

"We've all fought abominations before," Poppy said, a little too quickly. "Really a templar's presense is only required to dispatch an abomination if the Harrowing isn't a success. We're all Harrowed, my Lord. Except for Mattisine. We thought that there might be someone willing to conduct her Harrowing at the Conclave, but when we were provided this space..."

"Poor judgment haunts you like a fell cloud, does it not. Do I want to know where the lyrium came from?" Fergus asked.

"I found it. In the supply cupboard." Poppy pointed at the small door to the aft of the room. "I was looking for inspiration, for something I could teach the others. It's hard you know, to maintain a normal routine when you're on the road. Anyway, there was so much lyrium, enough for--for three Harrowings. And I knew the spell to open the path to the fade..."

The small, green scar faded. A ghost of itself, it was a mere sliver that dissipated at an excellerated rate. Kinlock tower had been riddled with similar scars, as had Soldier's Peak. Both were places that had seen intentional tears in the fade. The veil was thin in the Brecelian Forest when I sought Witherfang, but had not been pierced otherwise. At the time, I was focused on darkspawn, but there in the training arena, I gave the scars some consideration.

Was the Brecelian Forest free of such blemishes because the veil was naturally thin? Or did the Dalish themselves have some sort of key or artifact that could knit the tears back together? Or even keep them from forming? It would make sense if they did. Living a nomadic existence without the need for templars, such a device would be a useful, necessary flirt with power, and like all Dalish artifacts I knew of, disasterous in the wrong hands. 

_Do not follow,_ Morrigan warned, but she knew I wouldn't let her go. She waited for me, at that Dalish mirror, and inferred that her mother's plans were darker than either of us could be prepared for. She of course thought I conspired to find her from anger. But I had followed for reasons she again had misunderstood. I cared for her still, valued her hard-won friendship. I had made her a mother for Andraste's sake, an action I didn't take lightly. I wanted her to know she didn't need to go it alone. I needed her to know I would drop everything for the little life we created together. A son, I learned. I had a son. She spoke of him with defiance, challenging me to renege on my word, to strip him from her. _He's safe. That is all you need know._

"Shall we address the ferret in the room?" I asked, wishing I knew then what the present had taught me. I would have asked different questions of the wilder witch, though the end result could have been the same. Morrigan had a knack for pointing our attention to Flemeth so we couldn't see what she herself was planning. "There was more than one demon here, and I'm assuming demons don't usually pass through the path to the fade during a Harrowing unless it comes through as a possession. Kind of the whole point to a Harrowing I would think."

"You're right, of course, your Highness." Her eyes cast down to the floor. There was defeat in her voice. "I forgot the part of the spell that makes the path tether to the person--ah, I mean to make it so nothing can come out of the fade. And I guess I didn't need to use as much lyrium as I did. But Mattisine isn't possessed if that is what concerns you."

"She could be," said one of the other mages. "Poppy you remember what happened with Columbine Abernathy, don't you?"

"Mattisine is not an abomination." Poppy scowled, placing undue emphasis her opinion.

"I don't suppose there is a way to be sure?" Fergus asked.

I looked at the scar on my hand, already healed, and wondered. Avernus's experiments were unforgivable, but the knowledge gained from them was invaluable. Demons and the taint didn't seem to mix without extreme force. In my short, untrained tenure, I hadn't heard of any demon possessing a warden. Well, Anders, though the circumstances surrounding that pairing had to be unique. I didn't count Sofia Dryden either, because she was a corpse inhabited by a demon, so really a shamble and not an abomination

Wynne wasn't a warden, but she was technically an abomination. And she was a formidable mage. A bit on the preachy side, but potent, and she had retained her humanity. So...Was it right to condemn someone simply because of what she had the potential to become? The ability to lose one's self to a darker purpose was certainly not isolated to mages. Leliana straddled that impossible line between doing the right thing and doing the necessary thing. I drank the darkness in, willingly. My very blood sings with the base insticts of darkspawn as a result. And I often had difficulty seeing the right path to take.

_The right decision is a selfless one, my darling boy. And the one that requires the most courage to make. Never forget that._

"I don't think we need to worry about it Fergus," I said, listening to the lessons in my mother's memory. Poppy's emerald eyes met mine and spoke silent volumes of a debt of gratitude owed. I winked to set her at ease. "I don't think she poses a threat. Certainly not within the short time she's our guest. She turns, she'll likely be in someone else's territory."

Fergus grimmaced. "That's what worries me most. If later happens and we could have done something now...First Redcliff. Then Kirkwall. That fellow Anders--"

_Please, Connor is blameless in this. There must be another way._

"Fergus, you don't have to trust her, but I am your brother and your prince, and you can trust me." I breathed. Wynne had been an invaluable part of my success during the blight. If someone had taken steps, out of precaution...If I had done as that templar Cullen wanted...Would I have even been able to defeat the archdemon? And what of Connor and Isolde? "Mattisine is not a threat."

"As you wish my liege," he said with a mocking bow, before turning back to Poppy with a look that meant business. "Do not do anything this monumentally stupid in Amaranthine or Highever holdings again, my lady, or you and I will be on opposite ends of cordial."

Poppy nodded and drew the sword of mercy across her heart. "I will give you my life myself, Messere, if I am proved wrong."

"Maker preserve us," he said. He collected his shield from the floor with a heavy sigh. "Now that the excitement's over, I'm back to bed."

"I'll bet you are," I winked. "That bedwarmer of yours is going to need another coal stoked before dawn."

Fergus struggled to hide a smile and turned away when that failed. "Good night, Pup."


	5. The Long Kiss Goodbye

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The dawn comes, and with it, some goodbyes.

### Chapter Five: _The Long Kiss Goodbye_

The red sky at the breach of dawn hinted at another storm on the horizon. Standing in the shadow of Andraste's statue, I inhaled the innocent air, sweet and helpless, only just free of the scent of burning fade, and drank in the moment of calm. The tempest would have its way with Thedas all too soon.

The quiet mages loaded some things in a wagon that the Order provided, making a point to draw as little attention to themselves as was possible in the wake of their misguided adventure. They must have felt their welcome had worn thin, or believed more obstacles would slow their migration to the Conclave and wanted an early start. Poppy tossed me glances intermittently, leaving me with the impression that there was something she wanted to ask me, or tell me. I had no desire to dredge up what had transpired in the night. Pointing fingers and incessant apologies only served to try my patience as of late, patience already made too painfully short by the echoes of taint and darkness. I vowed to leave her be until she summoned the courage to close the distance between us on her own. 

She eventually had nothing else to secure for travel, and what lingered in the air was a restless air of foreboding. After a brief discussion with the huddled group of magi, she crossed the courtyard to me like one condemned. "Your Highness," she said, stopping at a formal length away and casting her eyes to the ground. "I..."

 _I know you need answers, but I do not know what is safe to tell._ Desperation clung to Isolde. Alistair did not seem effected, other than he recoiled upon his self to hide from her loathing. But I could taste her fear, and the taint within me burned to act on a base desire, to devour her, to destroy her essence. I had only anger then, to stave off the beast, and I could tell Isolde wasn't telling the complete truth. 

Strange that Poppy sparked that memory. I bit my tongue and took a knee at the marble statue of Andraste, driving the taint to ground with a hasty prayer to the Maker, lest she rousted the whole of the beast within. 

The sudden move startled her. "Your Highness?"

I continued in silence, focusing on the Canticle of Transfigurations. _For the Maker shall be her beacon and her shield..._

Beacon.

_Bacon._

_She shall know the peas of the Maker's Benediction._

I suppressed a chuckle. For a while, the chantry in Denerim became a regular stop for me whenever I left Fort Drakon for the marketplace. I'd visit with Sister Theohild for a strong dose of healthy realism and a quick lunch away from pandering numb-skulls. She never failed to call things how she saw them, and never held her punches. When she died, a piece of Denerim died with her. I missed her greatly, that self-appointed Bane of Fuss-Buckets. 

"Your Highness, I wanted to..."

She had taken a knee beside me and wrung her hands until the color fled from her knuckles. Nervous fear dripped from her like sap from a maple, sweet, ripe for a harvest.

I popped the taint loose from my thoughts and breathed. I needed a change of topic. _For she who has faith in the Maker, fire is her water._ "Poppy, have you ever been to Ferelden before?"

The question put her off guard. "N-no, your Highness. I was sent to the Starkhaven tower at eight years old. This is my first trip anywhere. My first boat, my first coastal storm..." Her eyes locked onto her hands and she added sheepishly, "My first Grey Warden. And heroic prince."

"May I?" I took her hands in mine until they relaxed. She blushed but met my gaze. "There's a shortage of perfect smiles in this world. T'would be a pity if you lost yours because of a drake like Lord Smugbutt Bencely. You must promise me, as your surrogate prince, that no matter how dark the path before you gets, that you hold on to that smile. Can you do that?"

A timid smile flashed on her lips in response, and she loosed a nervous laugh fused with breath. "For you, I will try," she said. "How can I refuse? It is not everyday that a prince threatens war against another for the mistreatment of a tiny, insignificant mage like me."

"I did threaten that, didn't I? And they say I don't know the meaning of the word chivalry." We rose together, and, while holding fast to her gaze, I kissed her fingertips. "Don't judge Ferelden too harshly, my sweet lady. There's beauty here too, though our roses would pale in comparison to you."

The tension changed in a heartbeat, from one of anxiety to another more honeyed. She shivered in a breeze too slight to have caused a reaction. "Of all my firsts," she said, in a voice barely above a whisper, "there is one yet..."

Her chin tilted up and her eyes drooped. I knew what she wanted. It was written in her soul the moment we met, and I readily obliged. It was a gentle kiss at first, until her awkwardness gave way to a deep-seeded hunger. Her mouth parted quickly, eagerly, and the tips of our tongues met as soldiers in a passionate battleground. I broke away when I felt the moment shift to a decision: to either part as friends or engage as lovers.

Time did not permit the latter.

We parted as friends. Poppy spun away and scampered back to her waiting mages, a boyant retreat. She waved at me as their wagon passed by and their escort flanked them. True to the honor of their teryn, the Highever soldiers would see the contingent of mages safely around the Gherico Pass where they could rendezvous with Inquisition forces. I wondered briefly about sending a message to Leiliana through the caravan, but decided against it. Too many potentially prying eyes, and what I wanted to say to my beloved mistress was extremely personal.

A chorus of hammers sang through the courtyard, awaking with activity, drowning the mages' departure with a timely distraction. Thatchers, bolstered by my own royal guard, began the much-needed roof repairs on the more critical of the outbuildings. They paid me no heed. It was nice to be anonymous, even briefly. 

My guard captain approached the nearby swinehold with a bale of thatching balanced on his shoulders. I almost didn't recognize him in the simple linen shift. Without the polished mail and silk tabbard, he was as unremarkable as I. The man he followed was twice my age, thin and weathered, with purposeful movements. One of the thatchers, I surmised, considering the tools he carried.

"Caldiver," I said to my captain. "I see you've discovered a new occupation."

His grin unrestrained by the confines of a helm, he paused with a puff of breath. "Didn't think you'd mind, yr'Highness. And you're flamin' well guarded here." he said, shifting the weight on his shoulder. "My thatchwork isn't as skilled as my swordwork, but if I've no other value, Jack here says I follow orders well enough."

"Then I leave you be, Caldiver. They certainly need the help." I reached out to steady the ladder propped against the wall of the swinehold as Jack the Thatcher nimbly scampered over the top. "Though the population of the keep seems to have tripled overnight. Any idea where the laborers came from?"

Caldiver shook his head. "Don't know. I rousted from bed to the sound of horses and wagons. An all-business, no glory sort of lass named Draper was already directing this lot when they rode in like a breeze over Dragon's Peak. She didn't make time for full introductions. Last I saw, she was barking orders at some Dwarves milling about the foregate."

Draper, a person engaged in the selling of cloth and dry goods, or if my suspicions were correct, one of the Nightingale's network of whisperers. I felt an ache of loneliness settle in my heart. There was a moment during the blight, during a starry night, when the furtive glance of a lovely seductress inspired me to dream beyond the horrors of a darkspawn-infested world, to believe that I was worthy to receive a story-book ending. That Leiliana, Amethyne and I could sail to a place where no one knew us and carve out a humble, peaceful existence. To grow old together, see our beautiful Amethyne married and become a mother. To watch our grandchildren play amidst apple trees in bloom. 

That was the effect Leiliana had on me. She could drive the winter from my soul and usher in a brilliant spring of hope and love.

But I knew all too well, as did she, that I didn't settle well and I was destined to die very much alone in the depths of some ignominious pit of bile and rotting flesh, scratching at the hollows of my ears in attempt to thwart the screams of broodmothers in heat. 

I shook myself free from the creeping darkness and set about for the foregate. If indeed Draper was one of Leiliana's minions, I could send my beloved a message and trust it would be delivered.

Draper was an unassuming soul at first impression, but most of the whisperers were. Many were Elvhen, infiltrating servants quarters and alienages across Thedas. But Leiliana had others in her network, too. Soldiers, merchants, farmers...theives and transients--they all had code names and they all had roles to play. The only unifying factor was an unwavering faith in the Maker and in the Chant of Light. 

_Some choose to cloak themselves in dark and shadow._ Leiliana tossed a glance over her shoulder at Zevran's tent. It was a subtle accusation, one I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't been studying her face so intently. I wanted her so badly, to kiss away the sadness that marked her violet eyes, that I hung on every word she spoke. _I specialized in blending in,_ she said, _looking like I have every right to be there. It is invisibility, but of a different kind._

Draper moved like her, the grace with which she slipped between task-master and casual observer. Her red hair, a shade or two darker than Leiliana's, shimmered with a copper hue in the early morning light. I drew closer and was met with a familiar voice. "Warden!" She flourished a jovial bow and I felt the fool. As often as I had slipped down to the Warden's Rest, I should have been able to single her out from across an ocean.

That coy smile, that beautiful Redcliff accent, and those unforgettable seafoam eyes. _Belle._

_Very well. Let me see what Lloyd has stashed in the back. You can help yourself._

"Draper," I said, returning her smile. What was she doing this far north of Redcliff? Who was minding the Warden's Rest? "It amazes me that the Nightingale knew to send you here. I didn't know I was coming myself until the day before yesterday."

"Herself has naught to do with my being here, this time." Her eyes shifted about with sharp observation; a honed practice from years of being a serving wench. With no one to serve, she met my gaze and inhaled, dulcet and slow. Her tone softened, though she kept a formal distance. "It's good to see you again. It's been too long."

"Agreed. But." I resisted the urge to get closer, for she shied too quickly away. It had been a year or two since I was last at the Warden's Rest, the tavern I stole from Lloyd and gave to her. "Clearly you are one of the Left Hand's agents, so if she didn't send you here..."

She tucked an errant lock of hair behind her ear, indecision alight in her eyes. There was something she wanted to tell me. "I delivered a batch of my famous ale to a Highever tavern," she said after a beat. "It wasn't difficult to piece together the rumors. A castle servant said you and Fergus were headed here. A farmer complained the thatching for Vigil's was never collected by the Wardens and they were six months overdue for payment. And a sailor's sister said the storm moving in was going to be a severe one."

"So, the thatchers, your spontaneous idea?" No, there was more to it than that. She was truly skilled at reading people, so that part was the truth. It was what she wasn't saying, her hesitant, awkward posture...

"They needed work, I had a plan. Fortunately, they arrived here after that mess in the outbuilding, with the mages. Might have spooked them right off and then my surprise would have been ruined."

I measured that. "No, you didn't come here for me. I'm not that special to you."

She raised an eyebrow. "Not special to me? You daft swit, you're one of the most generous souls I have ever met. You saved us at Redcliff. You saved all of us. You saved me. And gave me a tavern that Lloyd is still too scared to steal back. I owe you everything."

"Come now, Belle," I whispered, leaning in. "We've known each other for too long for this dance."

"I..." 

Her eyes slid away and focused behind me. Then her face flushed, glowing with more than just admiration. I followed her gaze. My brother was approaching.

Fergus. Belle said Fergus. And she was here before the mages started their ill-fated Harrowing. Belle definitely said Fergus. She didn't call him the teryn or his lordship. She was on first-name basis with my brother. 

When I paused at his door in the night, it was Belle he was entertaining. 

_The sly dog!_

Suddenly, I was grateful I hadn't bedded her. We came close one night at the Rest, before Lloyd, the overweight slob, decided to actually work and went into the backroom to swap out a barrel. He didn't notice us behind the racks, but the mood was spoiled when he farted and fouled the air. At the time I was frustrated. I had one of her pefect porcelain breasts exposed and cupped in my hand and she was fumbling with the drawsting on my trouse. I was hard and ready and she was finally willing. A liaison years in the making evaporated in the stench of Lloyd's broccoli and egg salad gas. Never got another chance at her after that.

"When was it exactly, that you arrived last night?" I asked, both accusing and teasing. "And who exactly did you come to see?"

She blushed all the more.

"Pup, what are you doing?" Fergus had that tone. He never truly judged me for my exploits, only teased me about them, but I was now in territory he had staked a claim. 

"I was...thanking Draper for her impeccible timing."

"Draper?" he asked.

The blush disappeared from Belle's cheeks and she shifted, uneasy.

Fuck! I let that cat out of the bag. "Mm, yes. It appears your red-head is one of my red-head's network of gossips."

"Oh," Fergus said. "That I knew, Pup. I was just unaware of her moniker."

I sighed with relief. Belle did too. "You knew?" she asked my brother. "That I was working with the Left Hand of the Divine?"

"Of course. Well, I suspected anyway. I was married to an Antivan once, remember. I know what secrets look like on a woman."

I tsked. "And here all that time you spent in Redcliff visiting Teagan, you and Belle were knocking boots?"

"What? No." This time, Fergus blushed. "Not _all_ that time."

Belle was back to her slick self. "No, the knocking of boots is a recent development. Fergus chased me for five years, and I finally decided that he wasn't creepy."

Or finally decided on the better of the Seawolf's sons to allow in her bed. It made sense, remembering Teagan's wedding. Such a big affair in Redcliff, most of that Bannorn were in attendance. Fergus was distracted. I thought it was because I was there with his favorite sister-by-law but Fergus just had his mind on a skirt, a very special skirt. His focus was on a red-head of his very own. How often had I done that to him while he talked? My mind was always on skirts. Skirts, or food, or even bloodshed. The foremost of my tainted thoughts swirled about me even in the most enjoyable of conversations. 

In spite of the risk of developing an erection at the idea, I closed my eyes against the chill of the breeze and visited the memory of Belle to savor for the last time. She had the tenderest kiss, and the sweetest, softest skin. She gave me permission, leading me to the place behind the racks, loosening her bodice strings and pulling down her chemise. Her hand guided mine to Her breast and her breathy moan filled my senses with the promise of a pleasurable afternoon. I barely noticed the rising heat, as cool as her skin was to touch. I kissed her from her ear down her neck, her collar bone...Her pink nipple poked against my flicking tongue as my erection pressed against her thigh.

 _I respect you,_ I whispered, knowing what sex with her would mean. _I am a cad and many things said of me are very true, but I respect you and I want you to know that I am not seeking to conquer you._

_If I thought that of you, I would not have brought you here._

I said goodbye to the memory, erasing her part in it. I would not lust after my brother's partner. When I opened my eyes, she reached out and squeezed my arm. We were friends, and if I knew my brother, she soon would be my sister. Our moment of potential faded forever like the last of the twilight stars in the wash of the morning sky.


End file.
